At the 1996 trials the encounter between the teams captained by Edgar Kaplan and Howard Weinstein went down to the wire. With 32 boards to go Kaplan led by 19, but they lost the last two sets, and with them the match.

This board featured an unlikely game coming home with nine tricks. Weinstein doubled a weak two spade opening, and heard his partner bid two notrump — which the partnership played conventionally as a negative. This is an extension of the Lebensohl convention. Weinstein now guessed to raise to three notrump, giving his partner Ralph Katz the delight of playing the contract.

Katz won the opening spade lead in dummy, and immediately led a low heart to his hand, as East (Bart Bramley) ducked, to pass the diamond nine. Bramley won the diamond queen, and returned the club nine; Katz took his club queen, and played a heart to the ace and another heart.

Bramley took his king and got out with a low club, but Katz could win in dummy and throw Bramley in with his club winners. Bramley had two clubs to cash, but at trick 11 he was obliged to lead a diamond into dummy’s tenace for the contract, and a 10 IMP pick-up to Weinstein.

The trials were eventually won by the Robbins team, who defeated my squad in the semi-finals. They say you only remember your losses, not your victories. In this case, that is certainly true!

After the Nickell team lost the finals of the 1997 trials they had a second chance to qualify for the world championships in Tunisia. This board comes from their victory in that match over the Jacobs team, but it features a nice defense by the losers.

Brian Glubok and Sam Lev defended four spades by South after a multi two diamond opening bid. This opening bid shows a weak hand with either hearts or spades, and South arranged to be declarer by getting his partner to transfer into his major. (Warning: don’t try this at home!)

With a blind lead, Lev got the defense off on the wrong foot by leading the heart jack rather than a diamond, and now declarer was in with a chance. He rose with the king, unblocked the spade king, and played the club king, then ace, discarding a diamond. Lev followed with two middle clubs, neutral suit preference to imply no real interest in either red suit. When Glubok ruffed the second club, he carefully returned the heart queen!

This entry-destroying play (sometimes referred to as a Merrimac Coup) left declarer in hand for the last time. It allowed him to throw one more diamond loser from dummy on the third top club, but Glubok could ruff again. He could then play a third heart, to take a third ruff for the defenders, with the diamond ace to come as the fourth winner.

In this deal from the finals of the US trials the Deutsch team took the lead over the Nickell team in the middle of the match and pulled away thereafter, winning comfortably in the end. But this coup went to the Nickell team.

Both tables had an unopposed auction to four spades on the lead of the heart 10. For Deutsch, Michael Rosenberg took his king and played a club back, won in dummy for a trump finesse. Now although the defense could get a club ruff, it was with a trump winner, and declarer could discard his diamonds on dummy’s clubs.

By contrast, where Nickell was defending, Dick Freeman led the heart 10, won by Nick Nickell with the ace. Nick returned the diamond six to his partner’s king. His logic was that if his partner had the diamond king it might go away unless a diamond was played immediately, and that by his shifting to a high diamond, West should work out there was no future in the suit.

This was exactly what transpired. Freeman found the third defensive switch in three tricks, to the club four, which was won by the ace in dummy. Chip Martel played a spade to the queen, and now king and a club ruff beat the contract. It was irritating for Freeman to discover that his partner’s ruff was with a natural trump trick, but the 12 IMPS his side picked up was doubtless quite satisfying enough.

You can follow the trials this week at usbf.org.

Today’s deal from a bygone US trials saw Seymon Deutsch take on Jeff Wolfson in the semi-final stage. Both tables reached three no-trump, and Wolfson went one down on a spade lead after an unopposed auction, when he tested hearts then led the diamond queen from dummy. After the diamond queen was covered by the king, declarer tested diamonds but had only eight tricks – three tricks in each red suit and one spade on top. He could establish a second spade but had no valid route to a ninth trick.

By contrast, Chip Martel for Deutsch had the benefit of an informative auction. He won the spade 10 at trick one, and tested hearts, pitching a club from hand, then reassessed the position. He needed the diamond king onside, but since neither opponent had introduced spades, a 4-4-4-1 shape on his right was quite plausible. Playing the diamond queen would lose out to a singleton king, but if he were to play a low diamond from dummy and the king was in a three-card or longer holding, he would have had to lose an unnecessary diamond trick.

Martel correctly led a small diamond from dummy, and the appearance of the king brought him up to nine tricks; four diamonds, two spades, and three hearts.

The mathematics of the position are quite complex. But Martel believed that East had four cards in each major, and from his opening bid had at least three clubs. Therefore if he had the diamond king it had to be singleton or doubleton.

So he ran three rounds of diamonds, ending in hand, East keeping all four clubs and one spade. Now Martel played the spade king, ducked, then led a diamond to dummy, and a club toward his hand for his ninth trick. Had East kept two spades and three clubs, Martel would have built himself a club trick first before tackling spades.

On this deal from the US trials from a few years ago, Gary Cohler’s jump to three no-trump seems a reasonable if slightly premature action, since he was expecting to find his partner a doubleton spade. However a slower route of doubling and then bidding three no-trump might have led to reaching four hearts. A spade was led against three notrump, and declarer was in deep trouble. He led a diamond toward his hand but East, Jim Krekorian took the diamond ace to continue spades, and Cohler took the third round. Now if Cohler could have divined the heart position, he would have made the hand (which would certainly not have been impossible, given East’s decision to take the diamond ace with non-solid spades. Surely he figured to have the heart card). However Cohler played for the heart king to be onside, leading the heart queen from hand hoping that he could duck the trick to the West hand. That led to two down.

In the closed room, Neil Chambers as North played four hearts on the spade lead, which established a home for his club loser. Since declarer could see that he had to lose two diamond tricks, his target became to hold the heart losers to one. Chambers made no mistake, playing off the heart ace to drop the singleton king, the only relevant 4-1 split, and made his game.

You can follow a summary of the trials on usbf.org, and watch live at online.bridgebase.com

All this week’s deals come from recent trials for the US National open team, since the trials are currently being held this week in Schaumburg, Illinois.

Against four hearts, Eric Greco, West, started off with ace and a second club, giving the defense the first two tricks, and signaling for the lower suit in the process. Now Geoff Hampson, East, knew that his partner had the diamond ace. It would have been right to play diamonds if he had a potential trump trick himself, but he knew that he did not, so he played the spade jack, correctly won by declarer’s ace.

South then made the mistake of drawing two rounds of trump, using high hearts from hand. Now when he led a diamond towards dummy, Greco covered the 10 with the jack (allowing declarer to win one, but not two diamond tricks). At this point when declarer surrendered a spade, Hampson could return a trump, killing dummy’s ruff. There was no way to come home now — although declarer could have succeeded by taking only one trump and then playing on diamonds, when he can arrange the spade ruff.

In the other room the club ace was led and a second club ruffed, again with West giving a diamond suit-preference signal. On East’s instinctive diamond return, West won the ace to lead a third club, but there was no trump promotion when declarer ruffed with the heart jack. Since two top diamonds could take care of the spade losers, the contract succeeded.

Both players pushed just a little to reach four spades here, against which West led the diamond queen. Before you read on, it is worthwhile to pause for a moment and consider how you would play the game here.

The critical move comes early here. As is often the case when holding a singleton opposite an ace in a suit contract, the correct technique is to ruff a diamond at trick two. Then comes the spade ace-king, revealing that you have a trump loser. Life would be very easy if West began with specifically a 3=4=4=2 shape: a crossruff would succeed and West has to follow suit throughout. But if, as is more likely, West has only two or three hearts, then declarer needs West to have started with at least five diamonds to be able to succeed against best defense.

At trick four South cashes the heart ace-king, then leads a third heart. West cannot profit by ruffing a loser (since declarer would simply discard a club). Equally, West cannot usefully pitch a club, so West lets go of a diamond. Declarer ruffs in dummy, ruffs a diamond to hand, and leads the heart seven. Again, West cannot ruff in with the spade queen, nor can he throw a diamond, or he sets up a winner in dummy, so he must discard a club. A diamond ruff to hand is now declarer’s 10th trick.

This maneuver, where West can neither discard a winner nor prevent a crossruff, is sometimes called an elopement.

There were contrasting fortunes in today’s contract of four spades, from a team game. One declarer saw all the possibilities, and exploited the lie of the cards, one relied on good fortune, and got the result he deserved.

One declarer won the heart lead to play trumps at once. He ruffed the next heart, drew the last trump, and tried to drop the diamond jack-10. When the diamond honors failed to put in an appearance he ruffed the fourth diamond, planning to duck a club to West if he could. Alas for him, East remembered to split his club intermediates, and now whatever declarer did, he had to lose three club tricks, and the contract.

In the other room when West led the heart king against four spades, declarer won the ace and ruffed a heart in his hand. He then led a trump from hand. Had West ducked, declarer would have stripped off the diamonds and endplayed West with the trump ace. Seeing this coming, West flew up with the spade ace and returned a trump.

Declarer now played the top three diamonds pitching one club from dummy. Then he continued with the losing diamond nine and pitched another club from dummy. West was allowed to win the diamond jack, but was now endplayed and had either to give declarer a free finesse, or a ruff and sluff. Either way, South was home in his contract.

One of the simplest but also most attractive techniques of declarer play that we all learn is an elimination play. If you want the opponents to lead a suit rather than have to lead it yourself, then you try to remove all the other palatable options from the defenders before giving them the lead and forcing them to do something they would otherwise be unwilling to do.

If you can take out all the trumps, or all of a side-suit, the play may be foolproof. But sometimes declarer can only execute a partial strip or elimination of the other suits before throwing an opponent in.

For example, playing in six spades here, South wins the heart lead and tests trumps. When they fail to split, he should not take the diamond finesse. Instead he should attempt to set up an endplay to avoid taking the finesse until or unless it is absolutely necessary.

Declarer leads a second high heart, ruffs a heart and cashes the three high clubs before throwing East in with the master trump. Because he only has diamonds left, East must lead away from the diamond king. This is a partial elimination or strip, because declarer lacked the entries to eliminate hearts completely. Had East held a fourth heart, he would have been able to lead the suit and avoid opening up diamonds to declarer’s advantage. Then South would have been forced to fall back on the finesse, but at least he would have given himself every additional chance.